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Robert Farley Profile picture
Robert Farley
@drfarls
Senior Lecturer at @UK_Patterson @universityofky. Co-founder and editor of @lefarkins. Tweets reflect personal views, not affiliations.
2 subscribers
Apr 20 • 7 tweets • 1 min read
Briefly on the discussion of the Ukraine aid package... a significant number of Restrainers were fond of language like "exhaustion" or "weariness" and similar terms to describe the obstacles to further US aid to Ukraine. This was not accurate, and I'm pretty sure they knew it. It was unpleasant, from a Restraint point of view, to contemplate the actual reasons for the delay in aid; US political institutions create a series of choke points that enable ideologically committed minorities to block the preferences of broad coalitions.
Nov 25, 2022 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
Something I see but I don't quite understand... when folks say that Putin might be holding out for Trump to return to power... I mean, that's a really long time to wait. economist.com/the-world-ahea… Russia would have to continue fighting for the rest of this year, all of 2023, all of 2024, and then hold out hope that Trump bails them out in 2025.
Nov 23, 2022 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
I dunno... temperament is connected to politics. I like to tell people that if I'd been asked in 2007 to name three lefty bloggers who would became vicious reactionaries by 2020, the answers would have been G. Greenwald, Glenn G., and GG. And the reasons here aren't primarily political (although if you looked closely enough you could see the reactionary peeking through even then), they were temperamental.
Nov 23, 2022 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
When a Ukrainian backbencher or a third-rate American think tank apparatchik breathes a hint of "regime change in Moscow" the "Restraint" community goes apoplectic, yet the relentless stream of maximalist war aim discussion in Russia goes unremarked upon. This is what we mean when we say that Russia must be treated as a country with agency, instead of a natural disaster or other force of nature.
Oct 1, 2022 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
Here I work through some of the tough details that any peace negotiation is going to have to deal with... Starting with territory... there are four categories of territory in dispute:

1. Occupied by Russia but not annexed.
2. Occupied by Russia and annexed yesterday.
3. Annexed by Russia but occupied by Ukraine.
4. Taken by Russia in 2014.
Oct 1, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Tonight I am, for the very first time, watching 10 Things I Hate About You. I can’t believe we lost Heath Ledger at 28.
Sep 30, 2022 • 7 tweets • 1 min read
Y’all gave up a fortified tower so you could defend a village? #RingsofPower Y’all died ‘cause you’re stupid
Sep 29, 2022 • 7 tweets • 1 min read
Watching You’ve Got Mail for some reason and learning that Dabney Coleman is still alive. This movie is so 1990s it’s painful.
Sep 27, 2022 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
There’s an imaginable world out there where Russia offers a cease-fire along lines of control that leave it in possession of significant portions of Ukraine. That’s a really complicated world for diplomacy. It’s a world in which we need to have complicated conversations about justice and peace and the dreadful costs of continuing the biggest war that Europe has seen in 75 years.
Sep 27, 2022 • 6 tweets • 4 min read
@chrislhayes @RossBarkan Forcing Ukraine to concede Russian gains thus far does exactly this. It incentivizes further Russian offensive action *in this war* and it incentivizes Russian aggression in other contexts.

How do folks not understand this? @chrislhayes @RossBarkan "Let's end Russia's proclivity for aggressive war by minimizing the costs Russia has to pay for aggressive war! I personally can see no downside to this strategy."
Sep 27, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
This is not "the best answer." Nor is it a good answer. Forcing Ukraine to make peace by cutting off support for its military DOES NOT SERVE PEACE. It does not support the establishment of a stable, equitable settlement to the war between Russia and Ukraine.
Sep 25, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
This is the $2000 question. And at this point the only useful answer seems to be “I don’t know.”
Sep 10, 2022 • 7 tweets • 1 min read
So, we need to discuss something that people may find unpleasant.

The Ukrainian armed forces are liberating huge amounts of territory. Many of the inhabitants of this territory will be happy to be liberated. Many others will not. It will require an extraordinary degree of military discipline on the part of Ukrainian forces to not engage in reprisals against civilians who are not happy to be returning to Ukrainian control.
Sep 10, 2022 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
Point to keep in mind: Fight vs. Negotiate is a false dichotomy. This war will end in a negotiated settlement but the nature of that settlement will be determined by the outcome of the fighting. All of the whingeing from Restrainer types about “negotiate rather than fight” has always been utter tripe; Ukraine’s ability to fight Russia is a crucial variable in determining what a negotiated settlement will look like.
Sep 10, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
So not to get too "woke" but I do hope that Rings of Power offers some window into Orcish psychology and social life. I'll confess that I continue to use goblins and orcs in their traditional cannon fodder roles in my own D&D games, but at the same time I try my very best to give some explanation for why the goblins and orcs are doing the things they're doing.
Sep 9, 2022 • 7 tweets • 1 min read
Are these Numenoreans? Why would Galadriel not recognize Numenoreans? Nevermind I guess she did.

Would've imagined that Numenor would carry more weight on the international stage.
Aug 17, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
The Professional Centrist Prayer is that GOP primary voters will do the right thing as long as Democrats don't make fun of them but it turns out GOP primary voters never do the right thing. With the hilarious bit being that if you ever actually talk to a GOP elected official over beers they'll tell you about how fucking terrified they are of how psychotic the GOP primary electorate really is.
Aug 16, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Fantastic article. Among other things it lays to rest the spectacularly non-sensical argument that the Russian faceplant on the road to Kyiv was just a feint. washingtonpost.com/national-secur… That attack was a catastrophe militarily, incurring substantial losses and not overly distracting the Ukranians. Politically it was worse; it confirmed to the Europeans the extent of Russian war aims and the ability of Ukraine to resist.
Aug 15, 2022 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
A plea to everyone associated with @QuincyInst:

When you assert that the US should compel Ukraine to negotiate with Russia, can you please cite specific Russian peace terms and negotiating positions that Ukraine should be forced to accept? @QuincyInst Which cease-fire line, exactly, should we insist that Ukraine accept?
May 15, 2022 • 11 tweets • 2 min read
I deeply respect @Gadams1941 but the phrase “emotional hand-waving about Russian behavior” is… ill considered. There is no grappling here with the fact that “emotional hand-waving” is genuine disgust across Europe with Russia’s actions, and genuine fear in Eastern and Central Europe about Russian aggression.
May 12, 2022 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
The Restrainers lost the Finland-Sweden debate before it even started. The “quarrel in a far away country, between people of whom we know nothing” has been shown to be obviously nonsensical by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. If the US had never sent a single Javelin the war would have had an impact here.